


i would like my roses to see you

by sannlykke



Series: SASO 2017 [12]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Involuntary shapeshifting, M/M, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 14:36:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11946321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sannlykke/pseuds/sannlykke
Summary: there’s a tale for everything, you see:the creaking of the brass gate ghouls waiting in the graveyard,the sigh of the wind a faerie’s kiss;won’t you come in my garden to see for yourselfwhat you might otherwise miss?Midorima meets someone unusual on a day when he should not be outside alone.





	i would like my roses to see you

_there’s a tale for everything, you see:_  
 _the creaking of the brass gate ghouls waiting in the graveyard,_  
 _the sigh of the wind a faerie’s kiss;_  
 _won’t you come in my garden to see for yourself_  
 _what you might otherwise miss?_  
  
-  
  
Shintarou’s mother had told him never to enter the garden at the edge of the little town they live in, the wild overgrown garden with untrimmed rosebushes spilling out of the wrought-iron fence and into the little church with most of its paint eaten away by time and dust. It’s too close to the graveyard for comfort, and who knows what comes out of it at night, or even during daytime when the too-thick mist rolls in from the mountains to their part of the foothills.  
  
She needn’t worry; Shintarou is as superstitious (not that he would use the word on himself, oh no) as they come. He would buy his day’s protection from the witch next door every day, in the form of a little trinket or a stale piece of bread or a handkerchief dotted with daisies. Takao would laugh and tell him he’s being duped, that the true witches have all packed up and left for the hills years ago, but he’s never yet had a day of horrid luck while carrying his lucky items.  
  
Until today, when he walks up to her door to find a  _closed for one day_  sign in the window, the ink still faintly glistening.  
  
This can’t be true.   
  
Perhaps he should stay home then, today. The last time Shintarou had gone without his lucky item he’d fallen into the stream, his sister Shizuka had spilled hot soup on him, and he’d gotten his books stolen while he’d been eating. No, he would stay inside all day. Whatever bad luck would get to him would surely be minimized—  
  
“Hello,” someone says from behind, quiet but assertive, and Shintarou turns to see a young man standing there, pensive and beautiful in a crisp black suit, his red hair seeming to glow in the slant of morning sunlight. “I’m sorry to bother you, but…do you by chance know the way to the town cemetery?”  
  
Some young master who’s lost his entourage, Shintarou thinks, but even more than that he’s thinking about his eyes, serene yet commanding all the attention in the world. Still, Shintarou cannot be careful enough on a day like this. “What is your name, and why do you want to go there?”  
  
“Akashi Seijuurou,” the young master answers, a twinkle in his eye. It could be curious, or dangerous, or both, but Shintarou has not yet had his morning cup of coffee and the sun in his eyes makes it impossible for him to tell one from the other. At least he has offered up his name freely; the witches never do. “My mother was buried there some years ago, before my family moved away. I’d like to visit, but as I’ve only arrived yesterday I have not yet figured out where it is.”  
  
A most compelling reason. Shintarou finds his tone of voice soothing, even as he moves his face away from the offending sunlight. He had read about the Akashi name in the town library before, a wealthy family who had owned the town and its surrounding lands in the centuries before, who had resettled in another nearby town after the plague had devastated the town twenty years ago. Shintarou does not remember much of this—he had been too young.  
  
Akashi looks about the right age, and Shintarou, superstitious but with nothing else to go on, turns and points. “If you go down the road there, and turn left by the rosebushes, you will find the cemetery. It’s locked now. Perhaps you should wait until the caretaker comes by this afternoon.”  
  
“I will,” Akashi says, smiling, his scarlet eyes never leaving Shintarou’s face. “I’m very grateful for your help. May I know your name, if I forget the way?”  
  
Shintarou hesitates. “Midorima.”  
  
“Very well.” Akashi reaches out a hand, and Shintarou takes it. His grip, Shintarou notices, is cool and dry. “Thank you, Midorima.”  
  
-  
  
Shintarou finds himself walking towards the cemetery as the sun starts to hang low, a worry on his heart that had not been there previously. He carries yesterday’s charm (a single dried peony) and an old volume he’d borrowed from the library, containing Akashi’s family records.  
  
Perhaps he’d like to have a read, but it doesn’t take long into the trek to occur to him that Akashi might have a similar copy already. Well.   
  
He’s not worried about Akashi getting lost or trying to climb over the fence—worry is for the fact that he’s found himself outside again, without the help of today’s lucky item. If any reasonable affair could compel him to come outside, he thinks, it would only be—  
  
“Midorima.”  
  
Akashi is inside the gate, which hangs half-open, creaking. He’s looking up at the roses, and Shintarou follows his gaze.   
  
The roses are blooming—but that cannot be. It’s only April, and they have not, in Shintarou’s mind, ever bloomed that early.  
  
Akashi sighs, parts both woeful and petulant. “They are so beautiful, are they not? I remember Father saying our gardener planted them here to accompany the cemetery, in the old days…if only I could have one to remember Mother by.”  
  
Shintarou steps into the garden, boots sinking into the soft ground as he nears the rosebush. It is tall, taller than any other rosebush he’s seen before. There are thorns there, of course, among the leaves, but its fragrance remains soft and inviting. Akashi stands there like he’s meant to be there—not among the cemetery, not in the gentle afternoon light, but one with the flowers.  
  
“I brought this for you,” Shintarou says. Takao would call this an out-of-character moment, wag a finger at him about trusting nobody and everybody at once, but he isn’t here right now. Shintarou is not doing this out of the goodness of his heart; he simply doesn’t want his bad luck rubbing off on another person coming to him for help.  
  
Besides, Akashi seems grateful when he flips open the pages. Shintarou turns away, towards the rosebush, and reaches up for one closest.   
  
The thorn pricks his finger before he realizes it, blood oozing down his hand as he retreats with a single petal on his thumb. He bites his lip in annoyance; of course forgetting to bandage his hand would happen on a day like this.  
  
Akashi looks at his wound, taking his hand. “Are you hurt?”  
  
“It’s fine,” Shintarou says. He feels a little dizzy looking at the blood, bright red, red like Akashi’s eyes and hair and— “Let me try that again.”  
  
“No,” Akashi says, pressing a finger to Shintarou’s wound, his voice suddenly very far away. “This will do just fine, Midorima Shintarou.”  
  
-  
  
Shizuka wakes up from her nap late that day, noticing with some panic the light already starting to fade outside. Her parents were away visiting friends in a nearby town, and her brother—  
  
Where is her brother?  
  
Shintarou had said nothing about going outside—she’d seen him earlier pacing about the house like a caged cat, something so unusual to the point where she’d pointed it out and gotten reprimanded in return.   
  
Maybe he’s finally gotten rid of his preoccupation with lucky items. Shizuka wouldn’t know; the witch next door is nice enough, but one encounter with a pack of lethal cookies had had her convinced maybe she’s not cut out for this whole magic thing after all.  
  
None of the townspeople knows where he’s gone, though there’s not many places Shintarou likes to go, after all. The librarian tells Shizuka he’d borrowed a book on genealogy—for what purpose, he has no idea. Right—maybe he wants to look at the headstones in the graveyard.  
  
She has no idea why the thought occurs to her, but it does, and it does not leave her as she leaves the library and takes the main road down the street, past her house, until she sees the rosebushes. Someone ought to trim it, really, but at eleven years she’s not tall enough or strong enough for any of that.  
  
Shizuka does not find her brother; instead, there is a young man standing there, next to a headstone not far away from the edge of the garden. Shizuka looks at the gate, which is locked, and wonders how he got inside.  
  
“Mister,” she calls out, from beyond the gates, “I’m sorry, but have you seen my brother?”  
  
The man turns, his red hair brushed back by the wind. Something about his eyes scares her, but Shizuka does not run away as he approaches, bending down to take a good look at her. “Oh? —I don’t believe I see a single human being out here, except for you. What do you think?”  
  
Shizuka swallows. It’s true she sees nobody else, not even the caretaker, who probably is sleeping on his job again. Something flickers in the corner of her eye, and she sees a cat dart behind a tree, one of its front legs bandaged up. She suddenly feels very cold. “I…I see, it’s true. Thank you, sir.”  
  
The man stands up as she turns and walks away, fast, and then faster even when she realizes he is not following her. Of course Shintarou would not be here; why would he be nosing through those ugly grey headstones with creepy men who hang around graveyards? No, not even the roses are incentive enough. She’s sure of this, now that she can see the houses at the edge of town again.  
  
Her brother’s simply gone away for a little while, that’s all.  
  
-  
  
_there’s a tale for everything, so beware:_  
 _don’t walk through the door to places unknown,_  
 _don’t follow the witches into their dens;_  
 _you’ll see flowers with blood on their lips,_  
 _and into their world you’ll slip._


End file.
